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Saturday, February 25, 2012

Musings and Comments

There has been a LOT of talk about the GOP and the Democrat platforms of late. You know, like the Democrats started falsely accusing the GOP of not wanting women to have contraception and that all the GOP candidates are idiots. Count on the Democrats (through leftist news media) to drive the way people think about issues without people realizing they're being duped. Only more people DO realize they're being duped, so that's a good sign that Democrat's lies have gotten more blatant. The GOP, on their side, are all tangled up about the 'right' way to handle these attacks from the left, and which candidate is the 'only' one to take it to Obama.
Most of these people in the GOP are missing the obvious: they're accepting the premises of the left! Just because the left directs the national narrative doesn't mean we can't call them out on their falsehoods and redirect the conversation back to Obama. Gingrich is good at this, for example. The truth is Obama doesn't have a ghost's chance of succeeding and the GOP candidates could all beat Obama if they played their cards right because Obama has only 'anti-GOP' cards and no 'pro-Obama' cards left! His record is atrocious! The GOP historically hasn't been one to verbally attack their opponents but I'm thinking it's high time they did. Even if we can't count on our leaders to stick up for themselves, we the people sure can voice the truth about Obama's record (unreported or underreported in news media), the Democrat's lies about just about everything, and send them running for cover! By which I mean that we had better swarm the interwebs, people. Educate. Enlighten. Explain. This can be a civil process or more inflammatory, but remember the objective is to make people stop and think and reevaluate.

For example, you could tackle the media bias and comment thus as I often do - I have a file with these comments saved for replying to pertinent ariticles:

"Some Democrats will just shout the same talking points over and over without looking at facts, and especially without looking at both sides of an argument. Republicans and their positions are mischaracterized by the leftist media all the time. You can tell how afraid the left is in 2012 by how much they focus on, criticize, and mock the right - all to distract from Obama's (unreported) horrible failures in office! And so many liberals are duped by this! There is plenty of flip-flopping and corruption with Democrats too. Partisanship causes blindness on both sides. You've got to read both sides anymore to get a good idea of what's really going on, because both sides leave stuff out. The liberal media counts on its followers being gullible enough to not think for themselves. It is your duty to be a well-informed voter, not a brainwashed and partisan voter."

Or you could take a more informational attack about Obama's record:

"We literally can't afford more of Obama. Whoever the GOP nominee is gets my vote. The leftist media doesn't admit this, but the national debt has accelerated at an unprecedented rate under Obama, and it wasn't pretty to start with. It now EQUALS our entire GDP. Reported first in the UK, because the news media here isn't honest enough to do so. This debt doesn't even count the fact that things like Obamacare won't add into the total debt until all parts of the law go into effect, and you can count on the fact that it will be much more expensive than projected, just like any other government program. To top off the horrible debt, all branches of the federal government get an automatic 10% increase in budget each year, based upon spending of the previous year. This is since the 1974 Budget Reform Act. Any proposal to lower the automatic increases are met with cries of "Draconian cuts!" from the left. It doesn't take a mathematician to realize this is unsustainable growth and will quickly turn us into the EU if we aren't already."

Or you could tackle Obama's energy policy (or lack thereof):

"Domestic oil means jobs, a growing economy, and lower cost of living. Especially after the exposure a couple months ago of Obama's domestic oil exports in the past three years (found at CNN Money) at a time that our domestic gas prices are so high, one must wonder what Obama's really going for. If he cared about the economy or jobs, he'd lift the oil-drilling moratorium and allow domestic oil to be used domestically. Prices would plummet and we would have spending money! If on the other hand, this is about the environment as he'd like you to believe, why do you believe we're saving the environment when we're instead buying oil from distant, hostile, human-rights violating countries with less stringent environmental standards then our own? That doesn't fly. It must be the ensuing economic hardship driving citizens of the United States to turn to their government instead of relying on themselves. In other words, he's laying the building blocks of socialism despite the failure of socialism everywhere in the world where it has been implemented. Do you really want to follow in the footsteps of the EU?"

Or even Congressional issues:

"Contrary to the understanding of those 'standing with the 99%,' Washington has no intention of fixing any problems within Wall Street - they've been in bed with them (on both sides) for generations, and have rigged things in the personal favor of their insider trading and political donors in the forms of tax exemption and government money. According to the recent book, "Throw them all out," a strong majority of the corruption is on the Democrat side. Obama himself has more campaign cash from Wall Street than all the GOP contenders combined. We absolutely need to look for politicians - on both sides- who recognize the culture of corruption in Washington bringing us headlong into financial crisis, and who have the character to withstand Washington's corruption and change things for the citizens of the country. We shouldn't be distracted by the partisan bickering in Washington and be partisan ourselves, that will hardly help the problem."

Or on topics related in any way to healthcare or Obamacare:

"Obamacare is a poorly crafted piece of legislation which doesn't even measure up to its own objectives of lowering health care costs. Why? It doesn't address cost-drivers in medicine at all! Have you read it, or talked to someone who has? Your doctor, perhaps? Even before the full implementation of Obamacare, doctors are retiring and fleeing in droves. Bad for patients. Some smaller hospitals are closing. Bad for patients. Employers can't afford the more expensive insurance required under Obamacare and aren't expanding if not shrinking, bad for jobs and patients. Insurance companies are raising premiums because of Obamacare's expensive requirements: bad for patients. Bad for jobs if those companies fold. Even the public option isn't attractive: I've been on public and private and there is NO comparison in quality of care. Bad for patients. And of course, the costs will be astronomically higher than projected like every other government program, which taxpayers get to cover. Bad for everyone!
"The current law also says that come Mar 1, 2012, Medicare will no longer reimburse individuals involved in care, but give out a certain amount based solely upon diagnosis. This amount of money would not change based upon severity of the disease, length of stay, extra testing, etc. That means all doctors (and the hospital) will have to divide up the money in some way hopefully reflective of care given, and the result is projected to halve doctors' pay to a little over $100k. This might not be a big deal were medical education so long and expensive and malpractice so high. But Obamacare lacks any tort reform, so medical costs will continue to be high so that doctors can assure lawyers in court that they did everything possible to care for their patients, including unnecessary expensive tests and labs. Not that I blame them for not wanting to get their butts sued off. I blame Obamacare for leaving out changes to the biggest cost driver in medicine, but what do you expect from a bunch of lawyers?"

These are my standard comments but I have used other ones as the need arises, like for the cause of balancing religious liberties with gay rights. Or explaining the context of a quotation from someone in the GOP which has been mischaracterized. Or explaining what Mormons believe when 'facts' are not quite accurate. Or talking about the raw jobs numbers which are not nearly as hopeful as the ones manipulated by the media in Obama's behalf. Or explaining the GOP side of a particular issue by stripping away the media bias.

Did you know there are tons of liberal commenters in this country who honestly believe that everyone on the right is an idiot, hates gays, blacks, and women, and are counter-progressive? As if hating the welfare program as presently constituted and the unrelenting march of gay rights against religious rights are the same thing as being a racist and a gay-hater! The left continually writes articles pointing out the inanity of the right, knowing that Obama's only chance at reelection is making people hate the GOP while simultaneously keeping them ignorant about Obama's policies and record in office. I invite you on the right to engage yourself in the public forums. I give any of my readers permission to copy these comments directly and use them for their intended purpose: to educate the people on the left who don't really know what their party is up to or what the GOP is up to either, for that matter.

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For a democracy to be successful and for government to reflect and uphold the will of the people, it is imperative that citizens take their voting responsibility seriously enough to be well informed. The first step is understanding that there is no such thing as fair and balanced coverage anymore, including the polls and fact-checkers. Including both sides in your sources of information is essential to forming an educated opinion. Both sides leave things out. For example, the leftist news media leaves out the good qualities in Republicans, the Tea Party, conservative causes, etc.

Comments are welcome but civility is required, hence the blog owner approval requirement. We need to have a discussion across partisan divides, not a shouting match. No name-calling will be approved for publishing in the comments.